Pearl

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Introduction: A glimpse into Fate

In most every timeline, Elder Faerie pays a visit to a powerful witch alongside his own creator. During this visit, they are introduced to a powerful artifact: a scrying globe that can show you almost all of your possible fates.

In all timelines the visit happens, Elder Faerie is warned by his creator not to try using the scrying globe. In most, he listens and does not touch it. In a select few timelines, he does not listen and uses the globe to read his possible fates.

It is here he learns of the many trials he and anyone close to him will undergo. The peaceful world that he longs to preserve will cost him many things. His own peace will be less than brief, his friends in the present and future will suffer and die horrible deaths, and the peace of the world will be fleeting.

In most timelines where he learns of his fate, Elder Faerie is weighed down by despair and helplessness, unsure of what to do about his destiny. This indecision leads him to hesitate when his choices matter most, especially when he is trying to protect those closest to him. In turn, this leads to their suffering and pain. Over the many centuries of his life, Elder Faerie becomes racked with pain, grief, loneliness, and guilt for being unable to stop the horrors of the world from claiming himself and his friends.

However, in this timeline, Fate may not have the chance to hold him back...

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Part 1: A Change in Response

In this Timeline, Elder Faerie chooses to try and fight against Fate to build a better future for his friends and himself without having to make so many sacrifices. At first, he goes along with a few things, like helping Salty plant the Silver Tree.

Then the Kala Namak Siege happens, Salty falls to corruption, and he returns to the Faerie Kingdom, begging Elder Faerie to end his life. Elder Faerie explains what happened and tells Salty about the other Emissaries corrupting. Salty loses his mind and prepares to seal all of the Beasts in the Silver Tree...

Elder Faerie refuses to comply, stating that this plan won't work long term as the Beasts will still be a threat that could break out at any moment. Plus, the fact that they don't even know why the Emissaries Corrupted in the first place makes Elder Faerie believe that there is more at play here than meets the eye. Since everyone failed, there has to be a reason... right?

Instead, Elder Faerie offers another idea: Take away the Fallen Emissaries' Soul Jams and reduce their powers so that they can't hurt anyone while they try to figure out what happened.

Elder Faerie offers this plan to Salty and even adds a compromise: if taking away their Soul Jams isn't enough, then they will use the Sealing Ritual as a last resort.

Reluctantly (and I mean very reluctantly), Salty agrees to try this plan out first.

So, instead of the Beasts getting trapped in the Sliver Tree, it's the Soul Jams that get removed from them and stored here in their place! :D

The Beasts are still free, but their powers are greatly nerfed. They are still Immortal, cannot die easily, and have a very small sliver of magic. Without the majority of their powers, the Beasts can't really hurt anyone the same way they could before.

As for the Soul Jams, well... they were forcibly taken away from their owners (which they were about to ditch on their own anyways) and locked away in the tree. The Soul Jams didn't do anything wrong (at least in their minds) and are baffled about what Fae and Salty did to them.

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Part 2: the Shattering Ritual

For one hundred years, the Soul Jams were stuck in the tree. On Elder Faerie's end, he began using his knowledge of magic to create a brand-new spell powered by prism magic. He called it the Shattering Ritual. This spell would break the Soul Jams not into halves, but into tiny pieces so that they could be scattered across all of Earthbread.

Fae already talked to Salty about this plan a few times since he began his prison sentence. Salt was on board with the idea since it closely resembled his original objective of sharing the Soul Jam's power with the world.

Of course, the Ritual didn't exist before and had to be constructed from scratch. Salty helped Elder Faerie with constructing the spell.

After the Century of Imprisonment, Elder Faerie welcomed Salty out of containment with the Shattering Ritual. Shards of the Soul Jams were shot across Earthbread, their power now free for anyone to claim...

However, the centers of each Soul Jam (called the Pinpoint Fragments) were kept by Elder Faerie and placed within geode prisms. This was done so that he could use their power to find any fragments that have grown out of control or that have fallen into the wrong hands.

(Yes. The Shattering Ritual's utensil is a knife! Forks are for sealing, Knifes are for breaking things apart, and Spoons are for large power/soul-transfer rituals.)

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Elder Faerie's Current Role:

Keep the fragments from trying to recombine. Should any shards grow too big, hunt them down using the Silver Tree and the Pinpoint Fragments and break them apart.

Keep tabs on the Beasts. Check in on them to make sure they aren't causing trouble. Stop them if they are.

Keep the fragments out of the reach of malicious forces. If any villainous individuals get any, then take the shards away and bring them somewhere else.

As you may have noticed, Elder Faerie's new roles here make it basically impossible for him to stay in the Faerie Kingdom long term. He's always on the move hunting for shards, or villains, or the Beasts.

So, in this Timeline, he may still technically be the king of the Faerie woods, but not really. He holds the title and the crown, but he's almost always absent from the throne. The Faerie kingdom isn't a big secret in this AU either. Faerie cookies are allowed to travel wherever they want for the most part, but a large number of them choose to stay in the Silver Woods.

While Elder Faerie is away, Mercurial Knight is still in charge of the Silver Knights. But in Elder Faerie's place, there is a regent who holds the title of Steward for the Faerie Kingdom. (They may be an OC, or maybe another cookie from canon or a different game. I have yet to decide who.)

Now, why is Elder Faerie still the king? Why not have this new Steward be in charge of the Faeries from now on? There are a few reasons:

Elder Faerie Cookie was baked by the witches and is considered a Guardian of sorts. Power wise, he's the strongest of the Faerie cookies. (Also, we got recent lore implications that Elder Faerie may have been set in charge of the Faerie kingdom by the witches themselves, I think.) Even though the Elder Faerie in this timeline is trying to break free from his fate, he would still try to respect his creator's wishes to the loosest possible degree. Although, this respect might start to disappear in this AU, eventually leading him to completely abandon his duties as the Faerie King in order to pursue his self-chosen position as the Silver Warden. [The long and short of it: The witches put him in charge, but he may not stay in charge forever.]

Even though he isn't around, Elder Faerie is still protecting the world and occasionally needs the other Faerie's help to get certain tasks done.

He's popular among the Faeries. Even though he tried to step down in the past, (and to an extent, is still trying to convince the Faeries that he wishes to take other responsibilities) the other Faeries didn't want him to. A lot of Faeries miss him whenever he leaves for his quests. (They throw massive parties for him whenever he returns.) Some even travel with him! Silver Bell actually goes with Elder Faerie quite often.

Another thing that I should mention is that, compared to canon, Elder Faerie has gone from somewhat of an enabler/bystander to a workaholic. Silver Warden Elder Faerie is very busy all the time. While he cares deeply for his friends (Salty and Lily), the other faeries, and the world, he doesn't really have any self-preservation. This guy will run himself into the ground if left to his own devises. (TBF, both Lily and Salty have the same issue, so it's a trio of kitkats who are all willing to jump into a fire but stop each other from doing the same. It's quite funny. :3)

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The Beasts' Roles:

- Silent Salt Cookie -

Salty uses his Soul Jam to connect to the others for the Sealing Ritual just like in canon, but with the spell adjusted, all of the Soul Jams end up in the Silver Tree. His included. After it's over, Salty is still here and he casts aside his sword, offering himself to Elder Faerie as a prisoner. Fae puts him in a temporary space while preparing a better place for Salty to stay long term. What Elder Faerie comes up with is a sort of Magical pocket-dimension that contains everything you would need to survive. He moves Salty there, stating that his prison sentence will be one hundred years in this containment. Over the course of the century, Elder Faerie visits Salty as often as he can, talking to him and working through his feelings and thoughts. (In other words: Therapy. It's literally Therapy.) Occasionally, Fae lets Salty visit the Land of Silence to pay his respects to the dead knights. By the time his prison sentence is done, Salty is in a better place mentally and emotionally. He hasn't fully let go of his grudge yet (and he will probably never forgive the others), and he defiantly hasn't reverted back to the state of mind he was in as the Salt of Solidarity. But he's recovered enough to try and make his life his own! Albeit, without overwhelming power. After aiding Elder Faerie with the Shattering Ritual, he returns to the Land of Silence and finds an alive Salt Cellar who was waiting in the Catacombs the whole time. Unlike in canon, Salt Cellar isn't in that bad of shape since only a hundred years have passed. From there, they both work on cleaning the place up and restoring it. With the Tomb Keeper's help the Kala Namak Fortress is repaired, the dead are properly buried, and Salty began looking into a way to clear the Silenced Spirits to the afterlife without using his Soul Jam. He has yet to succeed here, but he has been able to pull off a myriad of otherworldly stunts in the process with his limited power: he found a way to speak with the dead, put up a restless soul barrier, and is trying to lift the curse of Silence as we speak. Of course, he doesn't spend all of his time in the Land of Silence. He often takes trips with Elder Faerie to locate and talk to the other Fallen Emissaries.

- Eternal Sugar Cookie -

Sugar fell to corruption the same way she did in canon. Her followers tried to get other cookies to go to her garden and many of them died in the Kala Namak Siege. However, when the Soul Jams were sealed away, Eternal Sugar got nerfed pretty bad. She has lost her ability to fly, she cannot make any new sugar angels, and she no longer has the power to control the growth of her garden. She has lost control of any entities and sugar creatures that decorated the garden. The wild creatures she took into her garden have gone rouge attacking anything that moves, while her own creations have lost the energy they need to live, and have started to slowly rot away. She can't even summon that many sugar clouds anymore, let alone flood any area with jam! Sugar was already depressed before she lost her Soul Jam, but she was able to mask it pretty well with her paradise. Since she can no longer control her garden and is forced to watch it rot away before her very eyes, she has been overwhelmed with all of the pain and sadness she has been trying to escape. Because she could not face her depression, nor escape it through death or fantasy, she decides to take the most painless way out of this nightmare that she can: Sugar uses what's left of her power of Sloth to petrify the remaining sugar angels and then she puts herself into a coma. [Yes, Pavlova is now a sugar statue. No, he's not dead as long as his statue remains intact.] When Elder Faerie went to check on her for the first time, he was stunned to find everything overgrown and out of control. He searched the new wilderness but could not find Sugar's resting place at first. He came back multiple times, trying to use the Silver Tree's roots to find her. (It was difficult to find her because she was sleeping in the golden tree at the center of the Garden. This is where the overgrowth was at its worst.) After the Shattering Ritual, Elder Faerie and Salty both came to the Garden to find Sugar. Armed with the Pinpoint Fragments, they finally found her resting place along with a message engraved on the golden tree: "The Angel of Happiness that rests in this place can only be awakened by a Kiss of Pure Passion." Since they couldn't wake Sugar up themselves so that they could talk to her, Elder Faerie sent a group of Faeries to clear out the nearest area around Sugar's Resting Place. In that group was Sugar Fly, who volunteered hoping to meet Eternal Sugar so that she can grant Sugar Fly's wish for beautiful wings. (In this timeline, Sugar Fly has not been coated with the syrup yet.) Perhaps it is Sugar Fly who will set out on the quest to find a hero that will awaken the Keeper of the Garden of Paradise?

The Rest of the Beasts [Oh boy... :(]

I do not have a solid plan for the other Beasts. I have a few ideas, but nothing is set. I'm not an expert on any of them, so I have no idea what they would do if they all got nerfed instead of imprisoned. For now, here are the basic ideas I have for the last three.

- Burning Spice Cookie -

His corruption remains unchanged from canon.

After losing his Soul Jam, he loses a majority of his strength and destructive power. He can no longer conjure weapons or disintegrate anything with flames. His strength has gone from godlike to equal to that of a slightly-stronger-than-average mortal.

Tried to cover up his weakness in front of the Spice Swarm by inspiring fear. This only lasted for so long before he was overthrown.

The Nutmeg Tiger tribe lead the coup.

Has gone into hiding. I'm not sure what he's doing now.

With Elder Faerie here ->

Elder Faerie can pretty much solo the whole Spice Swarm on his own. He beat them once in a fight and basically threated them to stay in their lands or else he would finish the job. (He doesn't like threatening other creatures, but in this case, he didn't have many other options.)

Is looking into trying to convince the Spices to calm down.

Elder Faerie has found Burning Spice, but Spice didn't say anything when they met. Elder Faerie and Salty check in on him from time to time. (These notes may change depending on the direction of Burning Spice's story in this AU.)

- Shadow Milk Cookie -

Shadow's corruption remains unchanged from the canon.

After losing his Soul Jam, Shadow Milk no longer has access to the Other Realm or the Dark Side of the Moon. His distortion, mind, deception, charisma, and hallucinatory powers are all gone. His raw magical abilities are nerfed hard (For power-scaling, he's about as strong magic-wise as a 7-year-old with average magical powers.) Oh! And of course, he no longer has access to the infinite knowledge he did when he was the Fount.

On top of his powers being nerfed into oblivion, his Spire has completely collapsed and any memories he's had of Knowledge that he gained from the Milk Lake of Knowledge are slowly fading into non-existence. So, he's slowly forgetting things he used to know like magical spells and incantations. He still has the basic skills like reading and knowing how to use magic, but now he needs a reference for spells, like a book or a scroll or something. He also needs magical artifacts if he wants to boost his own magic.

Outside of his nerfs, I have no idea where he's going in this story. He's a liar with no way to convince anyone to believe him. He literally has to resort to using Stage Magic (basically stage illusions) to pull anything off.

With Elder Faerie here ->

Elder Faerie is somewhat aware that Shadow Milk was the first Beast to fall. Fae has tried to find Shadow on multiple occasions after the Soul Jams were stored in the Silver Tree, but even without magic, Shadow is surprisingly good at hiding.

After the Shattering Ritual, Elder Faerie continues trying to search for Shadow Milk. With the Pinpoint Fragments, Elder Faerie has gotten close to catching Shadow many times, only for him to use some clever trick to slip away.

With the Soul Jam Fragments now dispersed, Shadow Milk has a very faint chance to regain his lost power and has started looking for fragments.

To this day, neither Fae nor Salty have been able to talk to Shadow at all.

- Mystic Flour Cookie -

[Out of all of the beasts, I have almost no of ideas for her. Sorry! :(]

Her corruption remains unchanged from the canon. She still gets broken out of her cocoon from false rumors.

After the Soul Jams were sealed away, she has lost any powers she had over the Flour Plague. Even if she tries to use other means to replicate it, the plague comes out as more of a mild cold rather than a deadly illness. Her apathy powers are also pretty much completely shot. Any wish-granting powers she had are also gone. Her will is still unwavering, but there is no power to wield with it.

I don't know how she's coping or if she got kicked out of her own Pagoda. I may have her do something with Peach Blossom though...

With Elder Faerie here ->

He actually managed to find her before the Shattering Ritual. (Place, circumstance, and time are unconfirmed at this moment.)

Fae is a bit more sympathetic towards Flour's situation (but is still cautious due to her corruption.)

After the Ritual, Fae brings Salty with him so they can talk about what happened. (This part may change)

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Fragment Hunters and The Ancient Heroes:

I'll touch on this briefly compared to everything else, as I may want to flesh these ideas out in their own posts.

- Fragment Hunters -

This just refers to anyone who hunts down the Soul Jam Fragments. Now, Elder Faerie did shatter them to share with the world, so he's not against the idea of cookies using the fragments. However, he's very careful about who he lets keep them, and for good reason.

If he finds someone who wants to use the power of the Soul Jam for good or is looking for something to help solve a crisis, he will allow that party to keep a fragment to help others in need.

If he comes across someone who's trying to use the Soul Jam's power for evil or selfish reasons, then Elder Faerie will remove their power and move it someone else they can't reach. Since Elder Faerie is constantly chasing down nefarious Fragment Hunters, he is only barely able to keep up with them all.

This problem will only get worse when various organized parties (Such as the COD, St. Pastry Order, Soda Island Pirates, etc.) get involved with the story. He's going to have to call in help at that point! XD

- The Ancient Heroes -

Now, the Soul Jams are fractured into tiny pieces, but in the shattering process, they have also been somewhat separated into their two halves, albeit in pieces. Because of this, the Soul Jams are still capable of resonating with their previous owners... as well as some new faces who happen to show up.

In the case of resonation, the Fractured Soul Jam somehow forms a connection with the resonator, tying their souls to the Soul Jams. This grants those cookies the same base powers as the Beasts: near immortality, healing buffs, slowed-to-a-stop aging, as well as a small amount of power. Because the Soul Jams are so splintered, a single type of Soul Jam can have multiple holders for their fragments and have them all be connected to the source of the Soul Jam by their souls.

(This means that a Soul Jam can have multiple holders at once, and for the same part. I plan on making a few of the canon epics Fragment Holders as well as the Ancients. A few example I have are Dark Choco, Espresso, maybe Wizard or Custard the 3rd...)

Of course, this connection also comes with... a plea for help.

Even in pieces, the Soul Jams wish to be whole again. To anyone whose soul is connected to their power, they call out in the dreams of their holders, begging them to find the shattered fragments. They also give their wielders an ominous warning: "Do not trust the Silver Warden."

A small group of cookies has managed to somehow gain a pretty strong connection to these artifacts and are now on the hunt for more fragments to figure out what's going on. The Ancient Heroes' pasts remain mostly unchanged outside of them all only starting out with a little power rather than a whole half.

Another thing I want to mention briefly is this: The Fragments have some tweaked mechanics here. Positive Fragments can be corrupted or Tainted (ex. Truth becomes Tainted Truth), and Negative Fragments can become cleansed or Purified (ex. Deceit becomes Pure Deceit). The biggest deciding factor in this change is the Holder's intentions. I want to touch more on this in another post, as there are two characters in particular who I think would represent this idea best (Red Velvet and Pastry come to mind with this one! :D)

I will save more information about the Epic Fragment Holders and Ancient Heroes for later, but the only other thing I will add is this: Dark Enchantress does exist in this AU. I will touch on her in another post, as she and Elder Faerie have a lot of parallels in this story.

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Concluding this intro...

Now, with this AU do things work out better than they do in canon? In some areas, yes. In others, nope. If anything, things could escalate to a pretty spectacular level of disaster. Elder Faerie being a main player instead of a bystander defiantly makes things more interesting.

However, the biggest flaw he develops in this Timeline is that he takes all of the responsibilities onto himself. When things don't work out, he pins the blame solely on himself even if he did everything he could to fix the situation. He tries to keep those he cares about out of a situation not because he doesn't trust them (he does!), but because he doesn't want to drag them into a place where they could get hurt especially when things get really bad.

Unfortunately, this flaw is going get Elder Faerie in a lot of trouble in this AU. Hopefully over time, he'll learn how to ask for help instead of shouldering the burden of responsibility all to himself. After all, the worst thing that could happen to Elder Faerie here is him crumbling under the weight of the Silver Warden's cross.

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Anyways, that's the Intro! I have a couple of ideas I want to expand upon, but I also wanna fill in the missing gaps (like the other Beasts) and work out how the Canon would evolve with this change.